Virginia Gay Hospital is lucky to have a wonderful team of laboratorians and phlebotomists who work hard to get results for patients and their care teams as quickly and accurately as possible. Somewhere around 70% of treatment plan decisions come down to work done in the lab, and we are happy to work alongside our physicians, nurses, and other hospital staff to help find the right course of action for Virginia Gay’s many patients.
A typical day in the lab will start with daily maintenance and quality control on our analyzers to make sure they are ready to deliver accurate results for our patients. We may spend a short time in direct patient care, drawing blood from patients with care to be sure the blood is drawn properly, and the patient is as comfortable as possible. Then, once back in the lab, the samples will make their way through our many departments, including chemistry, hematology, immunohematology, microbiology, and immunology. Some common tests we perform every day, and that you may recognize include: a CBC or complete blood count, to look for signs of infection, anemia, and many other things; A CMP, or comprehensive metabolic panel, which your physicians can use to help in many ways; Or a respiratory panel, which can check for many types of respiratory illnesses, and can help identify how to treat a patient’s respiratory symptoms. Once the samples have been processed through our analyzers or the testing has been completed by hand (some tests still are!) it is our job as laboratorians to ensure the accuracy of the results before releasing them to the care team and patients, which can sometimes include retesting or even recollecting the sample. Close attention to detail is necessary in the lab, crosschecking things like the patient’s names and birthdates, the collection time of samples, and the steps in processing the sample all matter in getting an accurate result. Finally, we can release our results, and contact the physicians directly if something we have detected is critical to treatment.
The laboratory is often thought of as an invisible department, as we do not see as much direct patient care as staff like nurses and doctors. Let’s remember and thank our laboratory staff this week, as they can be just as critical in the care of our patients as the rest of the care teams. Thank you Virginia Gay lab staff for all you do!
